Charts of the day: More U.S. polarization defined

Stunning evidence of the radical disparities afflicting the U.S. workforce are two chartrs from a new report [PDF] from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, “Job Polarization and Rising Inequality in the Nation and in the New York-Northern New Jersey Region”:

First up, evidence of polarization in the form of new jobs over a four-decade span:

And a parallel devlopment in the form of polarizing salary differentials:

Since the 1980s, employment opportunities in both the UnitedStates and the NewYork–northern NewJersey region have become increasingly polarized. While technological advances and globalization have created new jobs for workers at the high end of the skill spectrum and largely spared the service jobs of workers at the low end, these forces have displaced many jobs involving routine tasks—traditionally the sphere of middle-skill workers. Moreover, these same forces have pushed up wages for high-skill workers disproportionately, contributing to increased wage inequality. The rise in inequality has been especially sharp in downstate NewYork and northern New Jersey, where the wage gap is now markedly larger than in the nation.